Mission Statement:
To help restore the proper relationship between our officials in Washington and the citizens of our nation, between bearing our own burdens and bearing one another’s burdens, among competing interests, and to promote the ideal of “doing all that is necessary to achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

Saturday, April 17, 2010

The Gauntlet We Face

The American Action Report began as a blog with a single purpose: to drive the rats out of Congress. Once I began tugging at that thread, I found, as the ancients discovered, that “…all things work together….”If we succeed in driving the rats from Congress, we mustn't assume that their successors will not also be rats, or will become rats through exposure to Congress. As many people already know, the system itself is a rotten barrel that spoils the apples. How do we gain by making room in Congress for other rats?I'm reminded of the writer who said, “Nobody ever reads what I write. I continue to write because I want to know what I think.” The more I wrote and discovered my thoughts, the more I realized that a whole-systems approach was needed. I also discovered that I make a poor newsman and probably a worse rabble rouser because I think too much and too deeply, and I have too many ideas. No, with my nimble fingers tickling the keyboard, the American Action Report is more appropriate as a political guidebook and reference book. If it ever becomes an honest-to-goodness book, made with real paper formed from trees that have been assassinated expressly for the purpose of giving people something to hold as they read, perhaps the name should be changed.Perhaps then it should be titled The John Book of American Politics. In book form, each article would be about two pages long. That length is perfectly suited for bathroom reading. One can learn more about attending to his constitutional responsibilities as he attends to his constitutional. Already, I'm convinced that neoconservatives (previously known as Trotskyites) and other authoritarian types have found that reading these articles has helped to relieve their symptoms of irregularity.As for solutions to our political woes, I'm not a bit optimistic. I've never believed in optimism. Optimism is the madness of maintaining that everything will turn out well simply because we want them to turn out well.No, I'm a possibility thinker. There's a difference.There are far more ways that things can go wrong than right. For that reason, I believe that things naturally go wrong; and they seldom go right except by planning and effort. If we sincerely want to “take our country back,” we'd better have a plan as to what we're going to do with it; and we'd better be willing to accept that responsibility. If we don't, we'll lose it again. Worse still, for each demon we drive out of Congress, seven more will take his place, and the situation will be worse than before. The rotten barrel must be cleaned before they can spoil the fresh apples we put in it as replacements for the incumbents. This calls for fortitude.I've also observed that there's very little that anyone can do about anything. Opportunities to affect things for good are few and fleeting. Here's the good news: The difference between a person (or group) that is effective and one that isn't is the alertness to recognize those opportunities as they arise (or anticipate them before they arise) and make the most of them before they can get away. This calls for prudence and vigilance.The members of Congress will never be better than the American people. If we want the blessings of peace with other nations, we must learn to be at peace with one another. We can't always understand each other. We can't always like each other. We can and should always care for one another's well-being even when we don't understand one another.If we want the blessings of prosperity, we need to respect one another's property and hold government leaders to the same standards.If we value the right to life, we must respect the lives of others.If we want the blessings of liberty, we must respect the rights of others and demand the same of government. That includes the recognition that people in far-off lands, who are no threat to their neighbors, have a right to be left alone.If we want a government of the people, by the people, and for the people, then We the People must become more closely involved in it.Sending an honest person to Congress, we send him out as a sheep among wolves. If ethical behavior were always simple, there would be no decisions to make. Many corporations have divisions devoted especially to guiding their employees in doing the right thing. We the People have offered no such guidance for our Congressmen.A careful study of the major acts of legislative embezzlement and shredding of the Constitution over the past ten years will reveal systemic failures that the voting public have failed to address. The demonically evil people guiding various embezzlement bills and human rights violations (the USA PATRIOT Act, the bailouts, and the “healthcare” scam, to give a few examples) through Congress followed certain patterns. They systemically cut congressmen off from their sources of guidance, lied incessantly, offered them a choice between two appalling evils, and pushed them in the direction of the decision the government gangsters wanted them to make.Many of them, having already signed away their souls, eagerly embraced these atrocities against their constituents. Others went along with the evils because We the People were not there to offer them the guidance they needed. When our congressmen are faced with choices between two evils, We the People can't always expect them to have the wisdom to find a third way. We the People must take that responsibility.The damage is done. We must clean up the mess we helped to make, bring about a rebirth of freedom, and take steps to keep from making a mess of things in the future.Congressmen who failed us must be replaced for the same reasons that a sick patient sometimes must be removed from the source of his ailment. If they're returned to Congress two years after being removed, they’re likely to return as better representatives. Congressmen who are willfully corrupt must be removed for the same reasons one might remove an alcoholic from his job as a bartender or a pedophile from his job at a day care center. Scoundrels such as they should be cast into outer darkness and never returned to any position of public responsibility. In all probability, criminal investigations of dozens of congressmen should be carried out.Sweeping the rats out of Congress, then, is not a cure-all. It won't be enough to drive the money changers from the temple. A clean-up from top to bottom and from inside out is needed. Much of that clean-up must take place within the lives of each voter. Figuratively speaking, our bones have been broken partly because We the People have repeatedly gone astray. If a proper cleansing takes place and the right spirit is renewed in us, then the bones that have been broken may rejoice.I pray that the American Action Report—admittedly, one of many blogs written by many bloggers—will, in its small way, serve as a reference and guidebook toward that end.